Ministry of Schooling’s guidelines for registering new college
The headmaster of the Nyali School, John Kombo, shows the students cassava from the school farm. The Ministry of Education has published new guidelines for registering schools. [Kelvin Karani, Standard]
Adequate classrooms and compliance with the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) are among the new requirements schools must meet in order to register.
And the classrooms must also have enough tables and chairs.
The Ministry of Education guidelines require a school to have enough classrooms from preschool to upper secondary.
“The curriculum offered must be reviewed and approved by the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) and registered by the Ministry of Education,” the guidelines say.
According to a document called Registration Guidelines for Basic Education Institutions by the ministry, the new CBC-compliant schools must have rooms for the educational pathways chosen by learners.
All secondary schools must have facilities that can offer at least two paths and all of the tracks they contain. Upper secondary schools with STEM subjects will also have the specific additional facilities to offer all four STEM courses.
But for those who continue to offer 8-4-4, two kindergarten classes are mandatory for registration. These schools must also have at least one laboratory.
Private schools pay Sh10,000 for each category of registration. For public entities, Sh2,000 is charged for five year registration and a similar amount for re-registration.
Institutions are re-evaluated and registered when they switch from public to private and vice versa. The guidelines also state that there will be a maximum of two public teacher training colleges in each district, beyond which registration will no longer be granted.
In areas with a large population, new primary or secondary schools are only registered if they exceed a radius of more than 600 m. Kindergartens connected to these facilities are only registered if they are within a two-kilometer radius.
However, the government will no longer register boarding schools. The government will also not register schools within 300 meters of a liquor outlet in urban and rural areas.
The suitability of the location for the school location, the size of the school premises and compliance with all official procedures are strictly observed.
“The directorate responsible for quality assurance and standards checks an application for approval of a basic education institution for compliance with the standards and confirms the availability of approvals for all infrastructures by the responsible supervisory authorities,” says the guidelines.
All physical facilities must be secure, learner and disabled friendly.
“The structures must be safe and comply with the building regulations of the civil engineering office as well as all other safety regulations applicable at the time of registration,” says the guideline.
All projects must be approved by the building construction department before they start in order to ensure compliance with the established standards.
School grounds will not host commercial ventures.
“No establishment of the site or the site may have any other use such as residential or commercial,” says the guidelines.
The new regulations also require that in order to establish a new public primary school in densely populated areas, the closest existing public primary school should have at least two branches with a minimum population of 480 students.
And for new public secondary schools to be registered in densely populated areas, the closest existing public secondary school should have reached three grades with a minimum population of 540 students.
However, if you want to set up schools in sparsely populated areas as well as in arid and semi-arid areas, you should have at least 60 students in the nearest existing facility.
“When registering special educational institutions, a maximum of 10 learners per class may be present for learners with physical, visual and hearing impairments.”
For students with severe disabilities, however, the maximum number is between one and five per class.
Registration for competency-based curriculum schools
